One word
by xfmoon
Summary: When you never thought you'd ever hear this exact word from this particular person, but you do. Tag to 1x16 The Red Scare.


**A/N:** I can't seem to stop myself from writing tags to this show. Hey, it's not like I have other and more important things to do with my life.

 **Spoilers:** for the whole show at this point, which means season 1.

 **Disclaimer:** I own no words, and neither do I own the rights to Timeless.

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One word: " _Rittenhouse._ "

That was all it took to break her heart into a million pieces and make what was left of her whole world to come crashing down upon her.

She could not believe what she had just heard her mother say. It couldn't be right, she must have heard wrong. This was not happening; it was a dream, a hallucination, sleep deprivation, side effects of too much time travel, because it simply could not be reality. How did she know that word?

There had been a tiny shift in her mother's bearings. Lucy had felt it ever so slightly when they had hugged. Now she knew what she had been bracing herself to say.

How had it come to this? Right when for the first time in a long time Lucy had been hopeful. She had been on her way to get her sister back; to get back the family that she knew and loved. But she just had to do this one thing first. She had to tell her mother that she loved her, because she knew that if everything went back to normal, there was a big chance her mother would end up being very sick again. That was the problem with wanting to change the timeline - or rightly change it back - it was oh so unpredictable, and you unfortunately couldn't have it all.

So she had decided to tell her mother the truth. In all likelihood once she changed the timeline her mother wouldn't even remember this conversation had ever taken place, so really there was no harm to it. Although technically she was breaking her confidentiality agreement. But not telling her all this time had been worse, keeping everything in was hard, they had always been able to talk about everything in their family. There were no secrets, or so she had thought, until she found out that her dad wasn't her biological father, and now this...

Her mother's previous words echoed in her mind: "You can tell me anything." Now they sounded hollow in her ears. Well so could you have done, Lucy thought.

Not 2 seconds ago she had been worried about her mother thinking that she was insane; spewing crazy facts and postulating that time travel was real. Now here she was almost wishing she was mad, because this was unbelievable. This person in front of her couldn't possibly be her mother.

It took her some time to register what her mother was saying. But after the initial shock sank in and settled like dust on her soul, all she could do was listen to the ramblings of this mad woman that was standing across from her, which could not be her mom. Lucy's thoughts kept repeating this mantra; not my mom, not my mom; they had changed too much on one of their trips, and now a stranger had inhabited her mother's physical body.

In that moment she had never needed Amy more. She was all alone, surrounded by strangers she thought she knew. Her world lay in pieces and her best friend was missing.

"You won't lose me." Her mother had said. "Rittenhouse would never allow it." But couldn't she see that Lucy had already lost her, that Rittenhouse already had taken everything away from her. Her life was imploding, collapsing in on itself, grasping what little certainty she had left, crumbling it all up, and spitting it out again in unrecognizable patterns.

Her mother knew Rittenhouse did terrible things. Did she condone them? She knew about the Lifeboat, about her time travels, even about Amy, but didn't care one bit. She had called her some girl that no one knows or cares about. Well Lucy cared, and the mother that she knew, the mother that had had, and had loved two girls, she cared too.

In this timeline it wasn't enough that she had been engaged to a man she had never even met. No, both her father and her mother had to have come from Rittenhouse families too. It was how they met apparently. It was in her blood, it was part of who she was. Her whole life was one big lie.

Lucy wondered if her mother - the one that lay sick in a bed in an alternate timeline, not this one - would have told her the truth had she not been sick. Would she have revealed the world of Rittenhouse to her? Did she get sick before she had had the chance to do so? And what about Amy, what would she have thought about all of this? Was it fair to bring her back and then turn her world completely upside down as well?

Lucy had never heard her mother speak like this before, she sounded so entitled. Calling her royalty, bragging about her heritage. Lucy didn't want to be royalty, especially not if it involved Rittenhouse.

Like herself her mother was a history professor; how could she stand there and, in all seriousness, declare that together they would change history. Control both the past, the present and the future. History professors didn't do that; dictators did that. How had she ever looked up to this woman? She had idolized her and had walked in her goddamn footsteps. Why? For what? So she could help Rittenhouse execute their masterplan. So she could be a pawn in her own life. Her future would not be incredible, as her mother so aptly predicted; not now, not after this conversation. Lucy was certain that her world would never look the same again.

The devastation was abundant and overpowering. She didn't know how much more she could bear. She had to lean herself against the back of the sofa as her body felt more and more heavy, she almost doubted that she was breathing air, because her lungs were burning as if on fire, and tears were beginning to well in her eyes. She would not let them spill however, wouldn't allow herself to cry, to show any form of weakness. With glossy eyes she swallowed down this woman's words and her pride in her. Took in the word "sweetheart" and let it become part of her armor against what would likely be a very long and lonesome road ahead.

She felt adrift, cut off, miles apart from everyone, even though she was standing mere inches away from her own mother. She needed to be strong. She needed to collect herself. To pick up the shattered pieces and fill in the holes. If this journey had taught her anything, it was that she could only ever really trust herself, or a very select few people. And even then, motives seemed to shift and change at will, to fit in secrets and hide reasons behind an everlasting array of lies. It was a sad realization, but nevertheless true.

She just wanted to go back. Back home. Back to before all of this had begun. Back to blissful oblivion and no time machines. Back to when she had never heard the word: _Rittenhouse_.

* * *

 **A/N:** I'm still not over this moment. What a mean cliffhanger, I mean come on, hasn't Lucy suffered enough. They better give her her sister back next season.

On another note I think I'm going mad, I'm not even kidding, I just can't seem to shake this show. And we're still more than a month away from season 2.


End file.
